Soon a stream of images flash by of Pelosi, the long-serving California Democrat, with lips tightly pursed and eyes and neck veins bulging in anger. "Montclair Mikie...will be a Pelosi liberal in Washington."

You can't turn on a television or scroll through a Twitter feed these days without some attack ad tying New Jersey Democratic House candidates to Pelosi, demonized by the GOP for years as the brazen, power mad "San Francisco liberal" and symbol of partisan dysfunction in Washington.

Facing the possibility of losing control of the House for the first time in a decade, Republicans are warning voters that a newly elected Democratic majority will reinstall Pelosi as speaker of the House, a post she held from 2007 to 2011.

But the ads, which are running heavily in three of New Jersey battleground districts, are also intended to cast the Democrats as stealth radicals who are simply out of step with the Main Street values of their constituents.

No amount of denying their support or distancing themselves from Pelosi has slowed the onslaught.

Democrat Andy Kim, who is seeking to unseat incumbent Tom MacArthur in the Third Congressional District, which includes parts of Burlington, Ocean and Monmouth counties, sought to inoculate himself from the Pelosi charge. But a month later, a Republican super PAC began airing ads calling Kim a "Pelosi liberal. He's not one of us."

In an ad recorded over the summer, Sherrill, a former U.S. Navy helicopter pilot is perched on the edge of a helicopter doorway, proclaiming, "there is too much partisan politics in Washington on both sides. That is why I won't vote for Nancy Pelosi."

But that did not stop her Republican opponent, Jay Webber, from producing his 30-second attack ad last week which featured audio of Sherrill telling an audience that Pelosi is the "most effective speaker of the House we have had in decades" and that she "applauds the legislation she's been able to pass."

Sherrill campaign officials say the comments were stripped out of context and that the general praise was a prelude to an explanation why she would not support her for speaker.

Portraying Pelosi as a villain might seem to be out of sync with tradition of the mid-term races, which is expected to be a referendum on Donald Trump's roiling, first two years as president.

But GOP strategists argue that the Pelosi attack has the power to attract not only Republicans -- her ridiculing $1,000 bonuses paid to some employees earlier this year as a result of the GOP tax cuts to “crumbs" burnished her image as elite Washington liberal -- but also disillusioned Democrats who see her as a political liability.

"Nancy Pelosi is the most toxic politician in the country" who reminds voters of "everything that they dislike about the Democratic Party, whether it be calls to abolish ICE, raising taxes or weaker borders," says Courtney Alexander, a spokeswoman for the Congressional Leadership Fund, a super PAC linked to House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wisconsin.

"And that paints a very nice contrast between the Democratic Party and the Republican Party,'' she said.

The PAC is running anti-Pelosi ads to bolster MacArthur and on behalf of Leonard Lance, who is locked in a tight race in central New Jersey's Seventh District against Democrat Tom Malinowski, a former State Department official in the Obama Administration.

Others argue that the attack has limited reach, especially this late in the race and with fewer undecided voters at stake. Patrick Murray, director of the Monmouth University poll, which has been surveying battleground races around the country, says the Pelosi attack aims to discourage disenchanted Republicans from defecting to Democrats, like Sherrill.

"It’s aimed at the wandering Republican voters,,'' Murray said. "It’s kind of a reminder of to ‘look past what you feel about Trump, look past what you feel that Republicans in Congress have done that you don’t like and just put Nancy Pelosi in your mind. We know that you hate her. And there is nothing worse than her in charge.’ '' Murray said.

Some argue that Pelosi is not as radioactive of a figure as believed. A CNN poll conducted in August said that only 34 percent of voters considered Pelosi as an extremely or very important factor in their voting decision this fall, the lowest among 10 factors asked by pollsters.

On the other hand, voters say Trump is far more important to their vote than Pelosi. Twice the percentage of voters, 68 percent say Trump is extremely or very important than say the same about Pelosi.

And not every Democrat has disavowed Pelosi.

Lance, for example, has tried to join Malinowski at the hip with Pelosi for most of the summer. And one point in a debate in September, Lance charged, that Malinowski "is in Nancy Pelosi's pocket." Lance also noted that Malinowski has received $14,000 from Pelosi and her leadership PAC.

But Malinowski refused to take the bait, and instead turned the tables back on Lance and the Republican leadership, which has, at times, taken an antagonistic attitude to priorities of northeast states.

Malinowski said he will only back a speaker candidate that promises to advance legislation that will eliminate the $10,000 cap on state and local tax deductions on federal tax returns -- a highly unpopular feature of Trump's tax overhaul -- and secure funding for the stalled Gateway rail tunnel project under the Hudson River.

"My often stated position is that (the leadership) should be about policy, not personality,'' Malinowski said. "I am quite confident that I can get us a speaker who can meet those conditions and that Leonard Lance cannot. There is not a single (Republican) candidate for speaker that will help New Jersey on any of those issues."

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